4. Today I’ve been thinking about the difference between the meanings of compulsive and impulsive and noticing that they both say “pulse.”

5. Could THIS have something to do with why fish are dying and birds are falling dead from the sky?

6. Floyd makes Mother Earth News ‘Great Places You’ve (Maybe) Never Heard Of’ list: Land prices were cheap, and that was advertised in an early volume of MOTHER EARTH NEWS,” says Fred First, a local author, photographer and columnist for The Floyd Press. “The first wave found that the locals treated newcomers relatively well, and that brought an influx of the ‘alter-natives,’ as some call them now.” According to First, some of these back-to-the-landers were potters, who planted the seeds for what is now a vibrant arts community. More HERE.

7. Where else but Floyd can you learn from an old-timer how to forage ginseng one day and then meet Wavy Gravy, the Woodstock clown with an ice-cream flavor named after him in town for FloydFest, the next? Read the rest of my 2005 WVTF radio essay, Homegrown, HERE.

8. Speaking of Floyd, the town where I live, HERE is a clip of Gibby Waitzkin’s studio exhibit of her latest work which includes so many of my friends. I was in Massachusetts in November when the opening took place, otherwise I’d have been there. I wrote about Gibby HERE.

10. A real life oxymoron bumper sticker: Honk if you love peace and quiet.

11. I was surprised and moved by how autistic doctor of animal sciences Temple Grandin hugged Claire Danes who won an Academy Award for her movie portrayal of Grandin because I didn’t think autistic people liked to hug. Danes’s acceptance speech was also moving. She said: “It’s just so special to be here with Temple tonight, I just have to say. I have to thank Temple. She’s still at it. She’s still working with incredible zeal and devotion to illuminate mysteries about autism and animal behavior and I have to thank you on behalf of the literally millions of lives who have been dignified and improved by your genius.”

12. My curiosity led me to the Wikipedia where I found this on Grandin: She has noted in her autobiographical works that autism affects every aspect of her life. She has to wear comfortable clothes to counteract her sensory integration dysfunction and has structured her lifestyle to avoid sensory overload. She regularly takes anti-depressants, but no longer uses a squeeze-box (hug machine) that she invented at the age of eighteen as a form of stress relief therapy, stating in February 2010 that she no longer uses it: “It broke two years ago, and I never got around to fixing it. I’m into hugging people now.” More of her fascinating story HERE.

13. A friend recently told me that he didn’t mind waiting in lines because he thought of it as free time when he wasn’t being asked to do anything, which gave me a whole new perspective on waiting in line and has caused me to wonder, “What do you do while waiting in checkout lines?”

#13: While standing & waiting in line I either:
(a) sort the rest of the items on my to-do list based on how far they are from me at that particular moment or how lazy I’m feeling.
(b) choose a random spot on the wall and zone out my brain for a little while…it’s very refreshing.

I always consider waiting in line as extra time to write in my head and work out plots and characters. I always keep a notebook on me just for those moments, but even when it’s not possible to physically write, the staring off into space aspects lets me get ahead when I finally sit down to the keyboard. 🙂

I loved watching that moment between Temple and Claire Daines during the Golden Globes, too. There’s a quote about people with autism: If you know one person with autism, you know ONE person with autism. My son has autism, too, but he actually LOVES hugging to the point where we had to continually set up rules for him regarding who he is allowed to hug (family, friends) and who he is NOT (total strangers). Numbers 11 and 12 made me think of that. 🙂

Gotta love the snowman sign…. and she had other very cute snowmen on her site as well… though not as cute as that little face on the front of the paper from the previous post. I know as Grandma, you think that too!!! 🙂

If you haven’t seen “TEMPLE GRANDIN”, the HBO Movie that has won numerous awards, and rightfully so…Try to rent it from Netflix, or wherever. It is truly inspiring in every way and Temple G. is an extrordinary woman!

About

From the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia I write to synthesize what I'm learning at the time, whether it be poetry, a political commentary, or a letter to my family in Hull, Massachusetts, where I'm originally from. Whenever I don't know exactly what it is I'm doing and it borders on wasting my time, I call it research. 'Dear Abby, How can I get rid of freckles?' was my first published piece at the age of 11.